The Information Super-Frog

Last night we went to "Mr. Bartley's Gourmet Burgers", an institution popular for decades across the street from Harvard University. Mr. Bartley's has a couple dozen types of hamburgers named after prominent individuals. H had the "Ted Kennedy" (with cheddar, mushrooms, and fries); I had the "Mitt Romney" (swiss, onions, and onion rings). The burgers were big, and the non-alcoholic raspberry lime rickeys refreshing. Afterwards to John Harvard's Brewpub for some local microbrew; the beer was pretty good but the venue too noisy.

This morning Hollie elected to stay in while I walked over to the Peabody Museum of Antropology, primarily to see what they had on display from their nifty MesoAmerican collection. In the same building complex was the Museum of Natural History, so I looked at the dinosaurs and amazing glass replicas of plants commissioned as reference materials from the 1880s through 1930s. Then the Semetic Museum with ancient near eastern stuff was right across the street.

I persuaded Ms. Hollie to join me to see more pretty stuff. We had been talking about going back into Boston to see the Museum of Fine Arts, but I guess we'll save that for another trip, as we concentrated on the wealth of museums within an easy walk of our guesthouse. We went to the Sackler Museum, with nifty stuff from Classical Antiquity, ancient China, India, and early Islamic art. After a break for ice cream at Herrell's, we went to the Fogg Museum of Art, mostly Rennesaince through 19th century Western, with highlights including paintings by Reubens, Bernini, Degas, Van Gogh, Ingres, the Impressionists, and other luminaries; connected is the Busch-Reisenger Museum of modern European art.

After this we were pretty museum saturated and my feet were tierd, so with detours for the Harvard bookstore then some bubble teas at Doda, we headed back to the guest house. We've been pleased with the Irving House -- comfortable, convenient, and a decent value. And they loan out passes for the museums!

We have to be up at Quarter Til Armpit O'Clock in the morning for our plane back (gotta get a cab-- too early for the T), and back to New Orleans tomorrow.

I had a good visit to Florida with mshollie.

Gator Nation, King Tut, Beached in Miami, Whistler's Red Bunnie, and Confederates seize the Indian Temple Mound

My Trip, By L'il Froggy

In Gainesville we visited the Art Museum and the Natural History Museum, which are at new locations on the University campus and have been much expanded from when I last visited them some dozen years ago. The African Art included an interesting beaded scabbard that reminded me of Mardi Gras Indian beadwork. We stopped at a yarn shop for Ms Hollie (who found some goodies for herself) and a wine shop for me (where I only got a marziapan chocolate-- they had a good selection of wine, but I was mostly hoping unsuccessfully to find a 6 pack of "Czechvar", the real Budweiser from Ceske Budejovice, Bohemia).

Gainesville has nice museums for a small city, a number of decent restaurants, and some natural beauty in the area. The city's psychological idenity, however, seems entirely tied up with fanatical devotion to the Official State Religion of the Florida Gators sports team. Gator Nation! Chomp!!

South of Gainesville stopped at the cute 19th century central Florida town of Micanopy, where I picked up a couple of good old New Orleans post cards (best found out of town if one wants to pay a reasonable price) including one with a nice view of part of Storyville and another of the (recently collapsed) New Canal Lighthouse at West End. Then on to the Florida Turnpike down the Peninsula to the Boca Raton area.

We stayed at a La Quinta near the Interstate in Deerfield beach (Wi fi in the rooms, yay!). We visited my parents who live in a high-rise condo with a view of the beach in Boca. The area was hit by Hurricane Wilma. Broken fascades, downed signs, and blue roof tarps were occasionally evident, but it was very unlike around here. All the traffic lights are working, and I saw no piles of debris nor trash. Shows what can be done when there's plenty of money and government support. Having a Bush family member as governor apparently has an upside. Perhaps we should see about drafting Jena as Louisiana's next governor.

I managed to get tickets for the King Tut exibition in Fort Lauderdale for H & myself. We got reservations for 9:30am, shortly after opening. Wonderful stuff, including a couple rooms on Akhenaten and historical context before the tomb splendors. Oooh, shiny. We seem to remember the exhibit at NOMA (a quarter century ago now) as having had more stuff, but this was well worth seeing none the less. The crowds weren't too bad when we went, but were quite heavy going in when we were heading out 2 & 1/2 hours later.

I should have brought a cd of the New Leviathan's "Old King Tut" to play in the car. They didn't sell that, nor any Steve Martin cds, at the Museum gift store, but they did have a large selection of other Tut Uncommon Merchandise. They had "I love my mummy" shirts, but no "Nice Tuts". I thought the kleenex box covers in the form of the Pharoh's mummy mask might not have been entirely respectful, especially since the kleenexes are pulled out of Tut's nose. Then again, that is how they removed his brain for mummification.

Hollie wanted another look at the Art Deco district of Miami Beach which we visited a couple years ago, so we drove around down there, then had lunch at Wolfie's Rascal House, a local institution for over half a century; it's a Floridaized version of an old Jewish New York Deli; about 5 times as large as anything one would find in Manhattan. I took Ms. H to Little Havana last time we'd visited Miami, so I wanted to expose her to other local culinary traditions. Gigantic Reuben sandwich and potato pancakes, delicious.

We enjoyed some beach time in the area. My parents took us out to "La Ville Maison" excellent upscale French place. On our own we chanced to find "Jamie's Downtown Grill", where we split the "Uptown downton quesadillas" made with brie, chicken, and grannie smith apples.

The Boca Museum of Art has some items of interest in the permanent collection, including a nice photography collection and a self portrait by José Clemente Orozco. The temporary exhibits were the big draw, however. A collection of old Japanese prints entitled "A Floating World" was a good compliment to the exhibit which drew me here: James McNeil Whistler works from the Hunterian Gallery in Glasgow. Some really splendid stuff, especially the items from his later years. Perhaps the highlight is a wonderful full lenght portrait of his sister-in-law with bold red strokes, formally entitled "Red and Black -- The Fan" but which Whistler himself refered to as "The Red Bunnie". Another very enjoyable exhibit was of fin de siecle French posters entitled "Toulouse-Lautrec" [in big letters, then smaller letters adding] "and His Contemporaries". Toulouse-Lautrec was the big name draw; there were perhaps 5 by him, but most of the rest was no less interesting. There were a couple of Alfons Muchas, who I've long been fond of, but my favorite was one I'd not seen reproduced before, a delightful Absinthe Berthelot poster by one Henri Theriet. It looked a good deal better than this reproduction I found on line but which gives you some idea. I doubt modern purveyors of intoxicants would have the honesty to advertise with a portrayal of users of their product clearly wasted off their asses. The museum also had an exhibition of nudes by Milton Avery. Although nekkid ladies is a subject dear to my heart, this wasn't much to my taste. I'd rather have one small Whistler etching than rooms full of Averys.

Back on up the Peninsula, into the Panhandle to Fort Walton Beach, where we stayed again with Ms. Cristina, as we did in September. We visited the Indian Mound Temple & Museum with tal_greywolf. It was "Heritage Day" so entrance was free, with various special events. There was a group of costumed Historic Reenactors, some in soldier garb. At first I thought they were portraying Indian Wars troops, but they turned out to be Confederates. A group of confederates got into a van with with a "Support Our Troops" bumper-sticker and the slogan "Stay the Course" painted on the back. Hm. Tal treated us to lunch of burritos at "Moe's" before we hit the road to go back west. While stopping for gas in Slidell we heard the cashier say "Yeah, you right" and knew we were almost home.

Total miles of the road trip: 1,970.3; Boca to my house: 890.8.